On October 13, Yang Dacheng, vice president of Zeekr (ZK.US), posted a video of eating hot pot at Zeekr MIX on social media, Claiming to “listen to the real voice of users”, which triggered a lot of complaints from netizens.
Eating hot pot in the Zeekr MIX car
This is not the first time that a car company has used live marketing. Previously, Liu Tao, co-CEO of IM Auto, had made dumplings in the back seat of a car, and a poster earlier this year showed a hot pot being cooked in an IM LS7. Chang Jing, founder of JISHI Auto, proposed the idea of an in-car toilet. Huang Hongsheng, the founder of Skyworth Auto, has frequently caused controversy with his health-oriented marketing.
Yang Dacheng captioned the video on social media: “For products, we still need to listen to the most authentic voice of users. It is still very effective to co-create Zeekr MIX with users during the product definition stage.” He also stressed that the air conditioning in the car was good and it felt cool. He also said that he could play mahjong in the vehicle.
Regarding this promotional method, many netizens complained that eating hot pot and playing mahjong are false needs for cars, and believed that Zeekr’s marketing direction was wrong.
Chinese netizens said, “I have driven the car for more than 200,000 kilometers, and I have never had the desire to eat hot pot and play mahjong in the car,”
“The whole hot pot is really unnecessary, just the fumes and steam of the hot pot, the car is disposable,”
“How to remove the hot pot smell in a car? What should I do if I brake suddenly?”
Automotive Industry insiders pointed out that in the extremely revolutionary Chinese auto industry, sales are closely related to traffic. To gain traffic, some car companies choose to create hot spots in marketing, and some of them overdo it and even overturn it.